Douglas Lumsden's Blog: What's Up with Douglas Lumsden?

I've had a wild couple of days. I wrote a Tweet, and it went viral. I have a few things to say about that right here.

I was thinking about books I've read in my life that had the most influence on my reading habits, and then later on, my writing. I think it all started with a 1943 collection of unexpurgated fairy tales called Giants and Witches and a Dragon or Two, which I read when I was a precocious seven-year-old in the second grade. My parents were appalled when they found out about it, but I think it worked out all right. Does anyone else know about this book? It's still in print and available, but I doubt that kids in today's world will run across it as easily as I did. I wrote more about it here: douglaslumsden.blogspot.com.

I didn't know that I was a pantser when I wrote my first novel....

I jotted down a few thoughts about plotting and pantsing in my new blog post at douglaslumsden.blogpost.com.

To celebrate the recent launch of the third book in my hardboiled urban fantasy series, I’m offering the first book of the series—A Troll Walks into a Bar—for FREE (limited time only):

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B081LV...

A great morning walk inspired me to reflect on my life as a retired teacher who writes a little. You can read more at douglaslumsden.blogspot.com.

A Hag Rises from the Abyss, Book 3 in my Alexander Southerland, P.I., series is ready to go, and I'm moving up my launch date from May 21 to this coming Friday, May 7. I'm excited about this for the usual reasons, but also because I think that this is going to be the cleanest manuscript I've ever launched. I am reasonably confident that I have rooted out all of those pesky typos that seem to persist no matter how hard I try to eliminate them.

I wrote about typos, proofreading--and flea baths--in my latest blog at douglaslumsden.blogspot.com.

A Hag Rises from the Abyss (Book Three of the Alexander Southerland, P.I. series) is now available for preorder from Amazon. Launch date is May 21!

Do book reviews matter? Of course they do! But why? I address the topic of book reviews in my latest blog at What's Up with Douglas Lumsden?

One of the oldest topics in literature is the idea of the struggle between civilization and the forces of the wilderness, a theme I explore in my upcoming hardboiled urban fantasy book, A Hag Rises from the Abyss. I wrote about it in my blog at douglaslumsden.blogspot.com.

After I wrote A Troll Walks into a Bar, I decided to add a subtitle: A Noir Urban Fantasy Novel. If I had to do it all over again, I probably would have used the word "Hardboiled" instead of "Noir," but the real problem might be my decision to classify my books as "Urban Fantasy," a problematic term that seems to mean different things to different people.

Should my books be classified as Urban Fantasy? I don't know. For further thoughts on this matter, go to douglaslumsden.blogspot.com.